Everyone looks familiar. Everything looks familiar. It’s as if I’ve been here before, in this lighting, with these people, holding this exact paper cup of black coffee with one sugar cube. I’m walking down the same gravelly road, in the same dimly lit park, listening to the same giggling child throw a frisbee at the same uninterested dog.
I often wonder whether I’m living the same day too.
I sit at my desk, I trudge to the coffee pot and I call my mother. I go on bad dates and I watch people pass by my window. Oh, I was almost back at my desk for a moment. It looks like it might rain, but it looks like that every evening at 6 p.m., and as always, I’ll keep making my way to the house I go to everyday, the stones scuffling against my pair of cheap black shoes.
Then something will change
I’ll bump shoulders with a stranger, my coffee will spill onto their shoe and it’ll finally rain.
Everyone looks familiar. Everything looks familiar. It’s as if I’ve been here before, the same laptop bag in tow, with the same furrowed brow, buried in thoughts of my own. It’s that couple again, the one that eats ice cream in cones like children. In a second it’ll spill on her blouse and she’ll let out an amusing shriek. Oh her poor silk shirt that she bought with half her month’s salary.
I often wonder whether I’m living the same day too.
I walk into work, wearing a crisp suit, meet a client and hear them tell their side of the story. I pretend to believe them, followed by a firm handshake. What did I shake on again? Who knows, but I probably sold off another piece of myself in the process. I walk out of the conference room, listen to someone say something about how it looks like it might rain. I’ll keep making my way to the bar I go to everyday, the stones scuffling against my polished formals.
Then something will change
I’ll bump shoulders with a stranger, their coffee will spill onto my shoe and it’ll finally rain.
The child, the dog, the ice cream will all become real in flashes, but what will always remain, is the threatening sky and two people passing each other everyday, one with coffee, one with shoes.